Problems that stem from accessing uninitialized software code or data are often difficult to debug. The behavior of a system that executes uninitialized code, or that mistakenly interprets uninitialized data as control information, seems totally random since the set of instructions that resides in the uninitialized locations were not generated as code but either as data from previous operations and the random values that the memory contains at a wake-up from reset or power up.
Several common solutions exist to aid in software debugging. In some cases, the software is debugged with a software simulator that supports data tracking. However, the software simulators have speed limitations and do not operate well in real-time environments. In other cases, specialized hardware is used to track and identify accesses to uninitialized memory locations. However, the specialized hardware has limited access over predetermined memory ranges, is limited in the number of accesses that can be tracked simultaneously and is limited in granularity. Furthermore, managing the tracking of uninitialized data through address monitoring is complex and might impact real-time performance.